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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27095761">Suptober Day 18: Dark and Stormy</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/tiamatv/pseuds/tiamatv'>tiamatv</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Promptober 2020 [17]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Supernatural</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Neighbors, Author!Castiel, Comfort Food, Fireman!Dean, Hurt Castiel (Supernatural), M/M, Pining, Pre-Slash, Sweet Dean Winchester, suburban life</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-10-19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-10-19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-09 03:48:41</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>3,885</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27095761</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/tiamatv/pseuds/tiamatv</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>“We should make up a really good story about how we met,” Dean tells him, gesturing with his spoon. “You know. ‘It was a dark and stormy night, and the green-eyed hero ventured up the crag to beard the dragon in his lair.’”</p><p>“I don’t have a beard,” Castiel answers, just to be contrary.</p><p>(A sequel to Suptober Day 13: Ladies, but can probably be read alone.)</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Castiel/Dean Winchester</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Promptober 2020 [17]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1954990</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>77</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>311</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Suptober Day 18: Dark and Stormy</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>There's no graphic description of pain or violence, but there is a graphic description of Castiel's scars.</p><p>Alright, enough of you requested a continuation, so here we are, a sequel to Suptober Day 13, Ladies. I don't know that you actually have to read that one to read and enjoy this one, but it might give you some perspective!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“We should make up a really good story about how we met,” Dean tells him, gesturing with his spoon. “You know. ‘It was a dark and stormy night, and the green-eyed hero ventured up the crag to beard the dragon in his lair.’”</p><p>‘Ventured.’ ‘Crag.’ They’re good words. Atmospheric. Dramatic. Overdramatic, really, but that’s very much the point.</p><p>That’s also very much <em>Dean.</em></p><p>“I don’t have a beard,” Castiel answers, just to be contrary.</p><p>Dean snorts with laughter—which is, of course, why Castiel said it. “Not denyin’ you’re a dragon?” he asks, digging into his serving of shepherd’s pie for another bite. Both his elbows are on the table and he’s hunched over his bowl like it’s going to grow legs and escape if he doesn’t.</p><p>(Dean has truly terrible table manners. Castiel has no idea why he finds it so compelling to watch him eat.)</p><p>“Dinosaurs were most likely homeothermic, and those that were winged had brightly colored feathers,” Castiel answers, pointedly. “If that is what our basis is, then I would be <em>quite</em> happy to be that kind of dragon.”</p><p>There’s a smear of mashed potato on Dean’s bottom lip. Castiel doesn’t reach out to wipe it away. He combs the fingers of his only hand through his hair to keep himself from touching. But Dean realizing it’s there and licking it away with a long sweep of his tongue is almost worse.</p><p>“Well, okay. So you can be a colorful homeothermic dragon with brightly colored feathers, I’m kind of into that visual,” Dean agrees, straightening enough to take a drink of his water. “And no beard.” He smirks and strokes the touch of stubble on the arch of his jaw. He hasn’t shaved—perhaps not since the last time Castiel saw him a few days ago. In the midafternoon sunlight, the coarse line of growth is bronze and touchable, and the edges of it almost sparkle. Castiel’s fingers curl around his spoon, and his nails dig into his palm. “I bet I can grow a very manly beard for this adventure.”</p><p>Castiel raises an eyebrow, but he doesn’t ask if Dean knows what ‘homeothermic’ means. Dean’s already admitted that he’s read or listened to all of Castiel’s books, and one of the most common criticisms that he hears of his own work is that his use of scientific jargon can sometimes be ‘dense.’ “I’m still waiting for an explanation for why we need this ‘really good story,’ though.”</p><p>Dean sits back in his chair and releases the bowl from the curve of his elbow. It’s clean enough that it could have been licked. He sets his spoon down into it with a contented sigh, and pats his stomach. “’Cause you’re a famous author. Obviously.”</p><p>“And because I’m a ‘famous author,’” Castiel encloses it in one-handed air quotes, “my next door neighbor couldn’t have just come over asking for cumin for his chili?”</p><p>Dean’s chili is delicious, though. <em>Really</em> delicious. As is this shepherd’s pie—the gravy in it is thick enough to soak into the potatoes, which are crusted golden and almost definitely have enough butter to give a real dragon atherosclerosis. Castiel doesn’t claim to know anything about meats, but he’s almost sure that it isn’t just beef in the base, and it’s studded with tiny bits of carrots.</p><p>(Did he ever tell Dean that he loves carrots, and that he’ll eat them raw? He doesn’t remember.)</p><p>Castiel didn’t know for sure that he had cumin in the spice cabinet, when he invited Dean in that first time. Only that he <em>did</em> have a spice cabinet, and that Anna stocked it fully when he moved in. It was her housewarming present to him when he moved to South Dakota from Des Plaines, Illinois. Before that day, he had never opened it, since he keeps the salt and pepper separate.</p><p>(He didn’t even much bother to cook before his accident, so why she’d think he wanted to do it after, Castiel isn’t sure. But he thanked her, because she’s his big sister, and it was a kind and thoughtful thing—even if unnecessary. The little metal spice canisters look nice, and the magnet mechanism to keep them inside the cabinet is clever. He’s already thinking of a way he might be able to write something like them into a novel.)</p><p>“See, you’re already taking creative license with it: I don’t live next door,” Dean points out, gleefully gesturing at Castiel’s west wall like they might be able to teleport through both it and the sheriffs’ house, next door, to Dean’s smaller one on the other side.</p><p>Castiel laughs, because he can’t help it—because Dean is so absurd. “Because <em>that’s</em> more creative license than a feathery dragon and a stubbled-up knight?” he retorts.</p><p>“It’s a slippery slope, Cas!” Dean opens his green eyes wide and waggles his eyebrows. He leans closer. Castiel suppresses the urge to lean in to meet him. “Next time, you’ll say that I wanted to get some <em>fennel</em>.”</p><p>Castiel considers this, tapping the back of the spoon against his lips, then he pushes his chair back and stands up. He walks to the spice cabinet and swings it open, studying its contents and occasionally turning one of the little metal canisters around on its magnet so that the labels all face the same direction before quietly closing the door.</p><p>Then he sits back down in front of him and picks up his spoon again, taking a leisurely bite of his warm shepherd’s pie.</p><p>“Yes, that would be very fantastic fiction,” Castiel finally says, agreeably. “I don’t have any of that.”</p><p>Dean pushes his chair back on its rear two legs and chokes with laughter. His pajama pants—because Dean came over in a Guns and Roses t-shirt that’s going threadbare at one shoulder, and Scooby Doo pajama pants—stretch tight over his thighs as he rocks.</p><p>Castiel doesn’t know how to tell Dean to dress in normal clothes before he comes over—not least because he knows that even if he had the words, he’d never say them. His heart hit his throat today so hard he almost wheezed, when Dean showed up like this, just as Castiel was considering what to order for lunch: he’s wearing a shirt he’s clearly slept in, wrinkled pajama pants, his hair askew, face unshaved. Even though it’s October, he didn’t throw on a jacket, and Castiel had to peel his eyes off strong, lean forearms.</p><p>“Got some rosemary?” he asked, eagerly, dancing from foot to foot and rubbing his arms because, well, it’s <em>cold</em>. “I’m makin’ shepherd’s pie! I have the thyme, but I’m out of rosemary. Thought I’d get some on my way home from my shift, but the store was closed already by then.”</p><p>Of course, Dean knows the contents of Castiel’s spice cabinet better than he does, at this point.</p><p>Castiel <em>should</em> tell Dean that he can just take all of the spices back home with him—it’s not like Castiel will ever use them. He doesn’t need them. Furthermore, they’re not bottles: he can’t even open the flat, fancy little round canisters, as pretty as they are, without assistance.</p><p>(He didn’t tell Anna that, either.)</p><p>But he doesn’t say that. He never says that.</p><p>And when Dean rang the doorbell—with his <em>nose</em>, oh, God, Dean—an hour and a half later, Castiel’s dictation headset was loose and looped over his neck, and he hadn’t dictated a single paragraph of his next novel, watching for that tall silhouette coming up his rigidly tamed, manicured walkway. Dean was proudly carrying two bowls of the aforementioned shepherd’s pie.</p><p>Of course he was.</p><p>Dean doesn’t know what he does to Castiel—how much it <em>aches</em> to want someone so completely out of reach. Of course he doesn’t. Castiel has made very sure that Dean can’t see it. He’s <em>himself</em> around Dean, after all—Charlie has been his editor for some fifteen years and even she refers to him as ‘Sir Grumpy,’ and certainly his accident hasn’t made that any better than it ever was.</p><p><em>Castiel</em> didn’t even realize how hungry he still was for laughter until Dean saw the artwork that a fan made for him—a painting of her favorite characters, Amanda and Tessie, painted in hot chocolate and tea, respectively—framed up in the entryway of his quiet, bare little home. He rushed up to it, so delighted—this gorgeous, full-grown man, and all but threw his head back with happy laughter filling Castiel’s house in a way that made him think he heard the echoes of it for days afterwards.</p><p>Dean’s adorable, sheepish smile when he turned back to Castiel’s raised eyebrow and scraped his toe sheepishly across the entryway rug is burned deeper than the echoes.</p><p>Castiel finishes his food at a pace less likely to give him heartburn as Dean tells him about Benny and Victor and their shift at the station last night—Victor apparently cheats at poker, and Benny’s experimenting with making homemade sausage. He keeps feeding them samples, and last night’s had ground turkey and endive in it. It wasn’t successful.</p><p>(Castiel will have to look up what an endive is.)</p><p>“What is it with you firefighters and cooking?” Castiel asks, curiously.</p><p>Dean snorts, and pats his stomach soothingly. “Well, we burn calories just hauling ‘round in our turnout gear!”</p><p>Dean’s got a real gift for storytelling, though Castiel doesn’t think that he realizes that. He’s so <em>alive</em>—all mobility and laughter and rock and roll. Castiel would never call him ‘cool’—though Dean would clearly like to be, with his music and that ridiculous car and the way he struts—and he’s so much more charming when he’s not trying to be.</p><p>He's been trying less and less, with Castiel, lately, and Castiel doesn’t know what to do with that, either.</p><p>“You never did answer my question of why we need an origin story,” Castiel finally says, looking up from where he’s stirring the last remnants of his lunch. He knows Dean hasn’t told anyone who he is, much less where he lives. Castiel wouldn’t actually consider himself a <em>famous</em> author, not by any means, but he has enough of a following that he wouldn’t want his real name or street address or his neighborhood openly shared, either. He was always private, even before—his novels don’t have his picture on them, and never have. Besides, he can’t imagine anyone at Dean’s firehouse would care about him, so who in the world would they even be telling?</p><p>(Perhaps Dean’s just being silly. Castiel doesn’t mind that, either.)</p><p>Dean lets the chair come back to rest on four legs, and the smile he has aimed at Castiel across Castiel’s little kitchen dining table is hopeful. And lethal. “Well, uh, I was wondering if you had any Halloween plans.”</p><p>Castiel blinks. “No,” he answers. He’d think that would be obvious. He goes weeks without venturing out any further than the sidewalk in front of his house, and that only to grab his mail.</p><p>“Wanna spend it with me, then?” Dean asks, eagerly. “At my place.” Then he chortles. “Y’know, well, two houses down, but <em>still</em>.”</p><p>Castiel’s jaw sags open, and it stays that way. It takes real effort to haul it closed, and by the time he has, Dean’s smile has faded around the edges. Castiel hates that he did that—that he made the brightness of Dean’s expression close up—but it was inevitable, wasn’t it?</p><p>“Doing… what, exactly?” he asks, dubiously.</p><p>“Obviously, you don’t have to decorate your place, if you don’t wanna.” Dean shrugs a little. He doesn’t offer to ‘help’ decorate the way so many people do when they see Castiel’s arm, and Castiel doesn’t know if he finds that comforting or insulting. “But I’m gonna, so I thought… you wanna sit on the porch with me and hand out candy? I got plenty. And two bowls! Big ones.” Dean grins, and wags a conspiratorial finger. “And really good hard cider for after. My brother sent it.”</p><p>Castiel frowns. “Why are two bowls necessary?”</p><p>“Why aren’t they?” Dean answers, his brow furrowing. “Jody and Donna’ll have two.”</p><p>That’s not exactly an answer—it’s no answer at all—but he supposes to Dean, it probably is.</p><p>Castiel sighs and leans forward on his elbow. He puts the spoon back down. There’s a thin line of yellow oil congealing in the bottom of the simple white bowl. “I don’t know,” he says, quietly.</p><p>The silence hangs, and Dean's hopeful smile fades away altogether.

</p><p>“Sorry, buddy,” Dean says, softly, finally. “Didn’t mean to push. I know you don’t like to go out. I just thought… y’know. Donna and Jody, I bet they really wanna get to know you, right next to them the way you are. Figured it might be easier across a porch? And it’s <em>fun, </em>seeing all the costumes. Something to talk about. You know?”</p><p>God. Dean’s so <em>kind</em>.</p><p>Maybe he understands that Castiel spent the whole of their first meeting tongue-tied, because Dean filled up the silence with chatter; it was only later, when he brought the bowls of chili by, that Castiel even found his voice again.</p><p>He knows what it’s going to be like. Children point, and they stare, and they ask ‘why’ because they don’t know any better. But the truth is, Castiel doesn’t mind when they do: they’re asking because of difference, of curiosity, because children feel that they’re entitled to answers about <em>everything</em>—not because they feel that they’re entitled to answers about <em>him</em>. He’ll tell them ‘It was a bad accident,’ most of the time they’ll say ‘Oh, okay!’ or ‘That’s too bad!’ and that will be that.</p><p>There’s no <em>judgment</em> to that, no presupposition of his ability or his worth. It’s just… curiosity. They ask if he can open jars (he can); if he can dance (he can’t, but that has nothing to do with his arm); if it hurts (yes, it hurts a lot, especially at night—but he doesn’t tell children that).</p><p>Adults are different.</p><p>They’re always different.</p><p>Mariah, at the office where Castiel underwent his occupational therapy in Illinois, called it ‘the drift.’ She was twenty-six, and lost her entire right leg to pelvic sarcoma. She survived—they both did—but it was hard to say which one of them hated their prosthesis fittings more—probably Castiel, since he doesn’t wear one anymore.</p><p>(On the other hand, <em>he </em>can still stomp around when he’s annoyed without wearing one: she couldn’t.)</p><p>“They try not to look,” she told him, annoyed, leaning down to rest her weight on the parallel bars. He looked up from the laborious process of practicing opening a tight jar with the base of it wedged under his armpit to meet her gaze. “Everyone always tries not to look, you know? They always try to look me in the eyes, and then their eyes just sort of… drift downwards. And then they can’t look away, and by the time they look back up, it’s like their brains went somewhere else, too.”</p><p>Castiel knew just what she meant, even then.</p><p>So Castiel says the words resolutely—with conviction, but not speed. Anyone who’s said ‘like ripping off a bandage’ has never had stitches removed. When taking off a band-aid, there's never any risk of anything splitting open that shouldn't.</p><p>“Why don’t you ever ask?” he demands, finally, and it’s not gentle. It's been more than a month. He’s been waiting and waiting and waiting, and he’s tired of the wait.</p><p>“About?”</p><p>Castiel gestures pointedly at the stump of his left arm.</p><p>Dean glances at it, but then he blinks. “Do you ever ask about my freckles?”</p><p>Of all the answers that Castiel expected to his question—the ‘it doesn’t matter,’ the ‘I didn’t want to embarrass you,’ or, the lie he hates the most, the blurted ‘oh, I didn’t even notice!’—that wasn’t one of them. Castiel blinks back, whatever indignation he was ready to have draining down his back.</p><p>“What?” he asks, blankly.</p><p>Dean points at his face—the slight spray of golden-brown dots on his cheekbones, the bridge of his nose. They’re so faint Castiel has to look close to see them, but… he has looked close. Closer than he should. He stares, he always did, but Dean has made his staring so, so much worse. “My freckles. I mean, you look at them all the time, but you never ask about them.”</p><p>Castiel honestly didn’t realize he was being so obvious. He feels his throat close a little as he swallows, his ears already going hot with embarrassment.</p><p>“I didn’t—that’s not—” he stammers, but then, after a moment of consideration, Castiel frowns. “That… doesn’t seem like it’s even remotely the same thing, Dean.”</p><p>“No, I guess not,” Dean agrees, and his handsome face has gone harder than Castiel thinks he’s ever seen it. “But it’s kind of the same idea, why would you ask about something that’s right there in plain sight but that I’ve got no control over?” He shrugs. “I mean, if you were in a wheelchair or had a lazy eye or just one eyebrow, would I ask why? Hell no. Your body ain’t my business, Cas. If you wanted to tell me, you’d tell me.”</p><p><em>“Your body ain’t my business</em>.” It’s true, and it’s meant so kindly, Castiel understands that.</p><p>But it’s also a good reminder, for Castiel. His body <em>isn’t</em> Dean’s business, because Dean isn’t going to look at him like that. So Dean’s never going to know that there’s a deep, ugly vertical scar running from Castiel’s breastbone all the way to just above his pubis, that the left side of his abdomen has a deeper, still-red horizontal slash from where he used to have a colostomy bag. His groin on the right side is pocked with a crater where they had to put a central line. The pins in his knee aren’t visible, but the grooves of the surgery are. Dean can’t see, because no-one can, the missing fist of his spleen, on the inside, but Dean is never going to see any of the rest, either.</p><p>All Dean can see is his missing arm.</p><p>And that’s <em>fine</em>. That’s good.</p><p>“That’s true,” Castiel says, softly.</p><p>“And just for the record?” Dean continues, in a rumble, “I hate my freckles.”</p><p>What? That’s… huh. Castiel would not have thought that. That’s like hating the stars on a night sky. Castiel thinks they’re <em>adorable.</em></p><p>Oh. Maybe <em>that’s</em> why Dean hates them. Men don't typically appreciate being thought adorable, Castiel supposes.</p><p>God, bodies are so strange, and people are even <em>stranger</em>.</p><p>“Okay,” he agrees, because that seems to be the only thing that a person can say to that. Then, because he can’t help himself, Castiel blurts, “Did you say <em>one eyebrow</em>, Dean? Why...?”</p><p>Dean flushes. But then he mumbles, “I mighta shaved off my little brother’s once as a kid, okay? It just came to mind! I dunno.”</p><p>“Was it an accident?”</p><p>Dean’s blush deepens and starts crawling down his neck. God, that’s so unfairly attractive. No-one should look that good beet-red. “Uh, no.”</p><p>Castiel’s laughing before he remembers he should be displeased, or stressed, or <em>something</em>. Something, anything, defensive or angry or pulling back into himself again—not light and so close to happy he thinks he might open his eyes and see it. “You must have been <em>such</em> a handful.”</p><p>Dean snorts. “Just you wait, I’ll tell you the Superman story sometime,” he offers.</p><p>“When?” Castiel asks, a little too eagerly.</p><p>Dean scowls at him, and crosses his arms. “When you’re not thinking so badly of me for shavin’ my little brother’s eyebrow off!”</p><p>Castiel agrees to Halloween—reckless, ridiculous—just to make Dean’s smile spring back to life.</p><p>He regrets it the moment Dean’s out the door, and closes his eyes, leaning his back against it and listening to Dean whistle. He thinks it’s Meatloaf: I Would Do Anything For Love. He thumps his head back against the door, twice, and sighs.</p><p>He should write his novel, but he won’t.</p><p>What would he have done, if he were a dragon, and not just a man? If a hero with a smile made to break his heart had ridden up to his door, tempting and laughing and shy? Would Castiel have done the sensible thing and simply not come out from his quiet, solitary existence?</p><p>Or would he have done the same thing all over again, and opened the door, inviting him in, knowing that someday, Dean will hurt him—unintentionally, and unwittingly, but he will—and, someday, Castiel will let him?</p><p>Castiel doesn’t know the answer to that. He never will. It was never really a choice, was it.</p><p>It wasn’t a dark and stormy night, when they met. It was a mild afternoon in early September—before the leaves began to change, just just warm enough that Castiel was wearing long sleeves. He likes the way the sleeves of the trench coat have enough structure to disguise his missing forearm, but simple cotton long-sleeved shirts are too floppy, and they slap annoyingly when he moves; he always pins them up. He remembers hearing the soft tinkle of Dean playing with the wind chimes Castiel likes to listen to in the morning.</p><p>He was so beautiful, and then Castiel actually <em>met</em> him.</p><p>Castiel sits down at his computer, and looks at his blank page. Then he puts on his headset.</p><p>“I have something for you,” he tells Dean, the next time Dean rings his doorbell.</p><p>Dean gives and gives, and if he has no idea how much Castiel cares, that’s all for the better. But Castiel can’t just keep <em>taking</em>.</p><p>Dean’s eyes go <em>wide</em> when Castiel presents him with a five-page printout in plain, 1.5 spaced Calibri: the first short story he’s written in years—certainly the silliest, and the most fantastical.</p><p>It’s the story of a feathery warm-blooded dragon who’s cranky because he’s molting, and a very manly green-eyed knight who keeps tripping over his beard. They meet on a very mild midday, because even though the knight planned to sneak up on the dragon at nighttime, his armor rattles so loudly as he’s riding up the mountaintop that the dragon comes out to find out who’s dropping pans on the doorstep of his lonely cave.</p><p>It couldn’t possibly be less like the murder mysteries that are Castiel’s bread and butter. Castiel doesn’t wonder what his fans would think of it. He doesn’t care, not really; none of them will ever see it. It’s not for them.</p><p>(He doesn't tell Dean how many words he had to add to his dictation software, either. 'Sonofabitch' is not something he routinely adds to his stories. Well, neither is 'knight' or 'dragon.')</p><p>He thinks Dean might hug him, but instead Dean promises him apple pie.</p><p>“And you know what? I’ll even use my own damned cinnamon, Cas!” he crows, and Castiel finds himself standing in his own doorway and laughing like he hasn’t laughed in years.</p><p>No, it wasn’t a dark and stormy night when they met at all.</p><p>But Dean hit Castiel like lightning, anyway.</p><p>And Castiel knows that he will never be the same.</p><p>~fin~</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I... probably should have put a 'mind the pining' warning on this, shouldn't I... I'm sorry!</p></blockquote></div></div>
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